Today's TV & Radio Choices

"This is Britain at its most beautiful," says James Miller on the threshold of the Goodwood Estate, Sussex. Back for a second series, Miller combines art and architecture with family history as he tours grand private houses. His enthusiasm is almost childlike: one minute he's cavorting with the Duke, the next chatting with the curator. He's so convivial, in fact, that he's perpetually on the point of laughing out loud. He drools over a carved fireplace, coos at Canaletto and Stubbs. Successive Goodwood Dukes have exhibited an aptitude for spending and making money, and an entrepreneurial spirit is evident throughout the estate. It's refreshing to see an "old" family capitalising on their advantages, rather than bemoaning the cost of a leaky roof. JM

Bride and GroomingFive, 8.00 pm

What makes this series so unsettling? Is it that its subjects undergo painful, potentially hazardous operations in the name of entertainment, and their reasons for doing so are often unclear? Or is it that love, the true kind, ought to make couples accepting of one another, imperfections and all? Or is it simply the sheer goriness of all those tucks and snips and lifts? In this episode, Peter and Angie, married for 25 years, submit themselves to "radical surgery" in order look desirable to each other once again. JM

Can We Save Planet Earth?BBC 1, 9.00 pm, not N Ireland

"How could I look my grandchildren in the eye and say I did nothing?" asks David Attenborough in the concluding part of this documentary on climate change. With experts predicting temperature rises throughout the next century, entire ecosystems could be lost, and floods threaten. Attenborough speculates on these consequences of global warming and what we can do to avert them. Unsurprisingly, the onus is on all of us in the West to reduce our energy use. JMFind out more: http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/hottopics/climatechange/programmes1.shtml

When Our Boys Came HomeBBC 2, 9.00 pm

This touching documentary follows three wounded veterans of the 2003 Iraq invasion: Albert Thomson lost his leg, tank gunner Daniel Twiddy was mangled by a shell, and Richard Turner suffered a near-total psychological breakdown. Film-maker Peter Gordon chooses not to embellish their stories with a voice-over, or graphics or reconstructions, remaining unflinchingly focused on interviews with the men and their wives. It's an intimate portrait of three fragile souls with sad tales to tell. Richard recalls of his time on the front line: "There was two of me. One was doing the job. The other was so vulnerable, so alone." It's regrettable that such voices, so dignified and instructive, are seldom heard. But there's humour among the sorrow, too. Albert, the amputee with a dodgy prosthetic leg, smilingly tells us, "I went out yesterday. I got blown over by a gust of wind." JM

Paul Merton's Silent ClownsBBC 4, 9.00 pm

Paul Merton examines the work of Charlie Chaplin, and interviews 83-year-old Marcel Marceau to try to understand the lasting appeal. "He says everything without speaking," says Marceau. A look, too, at the Lambeth life - in and out of the workhouse - that the Little Tramp led long before such poverty entered his comedy. MW

Extreme Surgery: the FacemakersDiscovery, 9.00 pm

The Craniofacial Centre at Miami Children's Hospital has gathered together plastic surgeons, neurosurgeons, psychologists and a whole range of support staff for pioneering work. They deal on a daily basis with youngsters in need of "extreme reconstruction", and this documentary watches them building jaws and ears and trying to prevent life-threatening brain damage. It is, of course, sometimes hard to stomach, but the stories are often as touching as it is possible to imagine. MWFind out more: http://www.discoverychannel.co.uk/ontv_highlights/promo3/

HouseFive, 9.00 pm

A two-part special for Hugh Laurie's still excellent medical drama, and a hysterical policeman with a bullet fragment lodged in his brain is causing much confusion. There's a lot going on, and it turns out that there could be a lot going round too. Fine time to go breaking the MRI scanner… MW Find out more: http://www.five.tv/programmes/drama/house/

Sideshow Stars: a True Story Discovery, 10.00 pm

The freak show, which you may have thought had died a disreputable death, is alive and well. This channel's version masquerades as an attempt to explain the medical conditions that were at the heart of acts with stage names like "Jo-Jo the Dog-Faced Boy" or "Fanny Mills, the woman with the biggest feet in the world". But calling hairy men "hypertrichotic" doesn't make it any less rude to stare. Martin Julien, as a softly spoken sideshow barker, comperes each segment. Special effects wizards and medical experts join in to offer analysis of, say, how Siamese twins can survive, but the effect is still ghoulish. If it's compelling, then it ought not to be, especially with jokes about three-legged men being the fairgrounds' "most well-heeled stars". MW

FlashSky Travel, 11.00 pm

Programmes looking at the very rich are often strangely sneering, but this is as much a business programme as it is a window on a new world. R 'n' B ringtones made Alexander his first million pounds, and he's keeping the business in the family. "You're late for work," he tells his mother, who is just happy to have reclaimed her sitting room now that he's got his own office. MW

Film choices

The Stepford Wives (2004)Sky Movies 5, 8.00 pm

Frank Oz's remake doesn't have much on the original, though it's certainly even glossier. Nicole Kidman and Matthew Broderick move in to Stepford, and rather quickly wonder quite why everything is all so homely. Reworked after test audiences found it too dark, what's left is just a toothless satire on American aspirations. MW

The Night of the Iguana (1964, b/w)TCM, 11.10 pm

We may yet be stunned by the Predrag Antonijevic remake of John Huston's masterpiece, still in production and featuring Jeremy Irons as a discredited preacher reduced to living a life of turmoil as a Mexican tour guide. But the original steamy line-up of Richard Burton, Ava Gardner and Deborah Kerr, plus Grayson Hall as the leader of a group of vacationing Baptist schoolteachers - "You beast, you beast!" - will surely be hard to beat. PWD

Radio choices by Gillian Reynolds

The Accidental Entertainers Radio 4, 11.30 am

Michael Rosen on the Brothers Grimm, 18th-century collectors of the folk stories which have shaped so many imaginations since. Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm, argues Rosen, might well be the stars on which Walt Disney wished. Yet the reasons for their collection, to preserve German cultural identity in the time of Napoleonic occupation, are significant. Red Riding Hood will never mean the same again.

Who Took the Cork Off My Lunch? Radio 4, 6.30 pm

A tribute to WC Fields, juggler, comedian, wordsmith, which richly deserves this evening repeat (it originally went out a few months ago). Geoffrey Palmer, whose own laconic and deadpan delivery has a bit of the Fields about it, narrates. Comedy historian Glenn Mitchell reveals Fields's links to the English music hall. Listen for how many comedians reveal their affinity with this maestro of majestic inebriation.